


home is where the heart is

by gothkink



Category: Little Mix (Band), One Direction (Band), Zayn Malik (Musician)
Genre: Beaches, Breakfast in Bed, Family, Feminine Harry, Fluff and Angst, Français | French, Greece, Honeymoon, Kissing, M/M, Marriage Proposal, Paris (City), Public Sex, Same-Sex Marriage, Smut, Summer, Sweet, Twisted and Fluffy Feelings, Wedding Night, larry - Freeform, slight - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-25
Updated: 2015-11-25
Packaged: 2018-05-03 09:01:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5284745
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gothkink/pseuds/gothkink
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It takes time, swirling butterflies, and doubt — though in the end Louis finds himself in Paris, la ville de l’amour, with a silver band on both his and Harry's fingers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	home is where the heart is

**Author's Note:**

> self indulgent, I presume. the idea of louis being nervous to ask harry to marry him, and them honeymooning and making sweet love in france drives me ballistic. also, harry being a gentle cub and making louis breakfast in santorini makes me mad. louis and harry makes me mad. major fluff, non discriptional smut. dedicated to the death of babygate. 
> 
> featuring a hint of zouis, nothing of lilo, too much of larry, the little mix girls and drake as ziams bestie.

The Earth seems to be rotating a lot slower on it's imaginary axis at this time. 

And the world's _so_ warm.

Louis is having a midlife crisis. Either, he'd be wasting 9880 Euros, or he'd grow a pair and put a ring on it.

It wasn't that he was nervous, no, he's bloody nearing 24. He's a grown man (a child at heart, some would say) and he's so ready for this. But it's just— he is. He's nervous. 

He's shivering with the intensity of the unknown, and the fluorescent swirls of vivid light, that shine off an opaque and sea of colours — droop his motivation. Harry, his boy, is just so outspoken, contrary to his bashful persona. And he wished he knew what his answer would be.

Harry stands there. 

Louis feels like a deer caught in the headlights.

He feels his head swirling, and those fucking sea of lights don't help one bit. 

It's like a gust of air, a shiver jolts through his body. And he remembers this morning: the shimmer the ring had set off, brighter than the blazing Sun, yelling in utter binary code, ‘ask him, you fucking twit, ask him.’

His fingers are still an icy blue from holding the box while Harry slept sound asleep, beside him.

 _Beside him_.

That was the thing. They were always beside one another. Even though they weren't married, and there weren't any papers briefing it out in discrete English, they still held the notion of it. They shared a flat, they shared the same bed, with hundreds of pillows — much to Louis' dismay — and they shared mugs, plates, and other diddles and daddles in that _same_ flat.

So if you asked Louis, he'd say that they were pretty much married.

But he just had to make it official, he just had to get down on his knees and ask the question he'd been practising with Perrie, and even bloody Niall for ages, because he loves the hell out of Harry.

Though, now, he isn't doing much. 

Harry's lips part, and Louis hears it before it comes.

“Baby, are you okay?”

Louis plays out each word in his head, like it's binary code, or Beethoven's 5th.

He doesn't say anything and that only makes the worry across Harry's face grow.

He inahles, and a stale scent of Armani tickles his nostrils.

Living with Harry had become a norm to Louis. He knows how it is to live with the lad, has all the non-existant, yet acknowledgable rules sketched out over his body. He already knows where Harry stores the extra toothpaste and shampoo when they're out, and Harry knows how Louis likes his eggs in the morning.

 _Sunny-side up_.

Yet, asking the one person he already feels married to, to marry him, seems like the hardest thing to do.

 _And,_ he had to tell his mum. Which was even more terrifying.

 

 _The sky breaks out into a deep violet, something akin to the time when Louis took Harry scuba diving on their second date (which was weird, usually there'd be a movie involved) and the sky wavered in pink and red, yelling profanities at Louis, and he_ just _knew then that he had to kiss him._

_The Vinyl Louis bought his mum a month back, sounds an old tune throughout the two-story home._

_Poma, Félicité's giant cat lays draped across the island, and he watches Louis with brown, glowing eyes._

_He must know that Louis has a ring burning a hole in his pocket. He must._

_“Surely, you wouldn't just drive out here, on a Friday night,” he mum says and turns around, “without Harry. Is something going on?”_

_See, that was the thing._

_Louis couldn't bring Harry along. Not because he was about to spill the tea to his mum, but because Harry had this overpowering femininity in the depth of him, that just came spattering out whenever Jay and Anne were around._

_And it wasn't that Louis hated it, fucking loved it even. But he wouldn't get a single word out with Harry pressed to his backside, chatting aimlessly with their mums about Vogues new cover, and the new pair of shimmery boots he spotted at YSL._

_That's why Louis had booked Harry in at some preppy Japanese slash Russian salon down the street from their flat, that specialised in massages and facials. He merely rationalised what they had scheduled for him, all Louis remembered was that it smelled of rosemary, honey tea, and had this ridiculous slogan of ‘Confuscious.’_

_“I'm having a midlife crisis.”_

_Jays eyes flicker away from the floral apron she's tying around her waist, instead, fixating her gaze on her son._

_“A midlife crisis? Louis,” she deadpans, shaking her head. “You're going to have to elaborate a bit more.”_

_Louis swallows the hot liquid, his stomach bubbling with the deep agony of butterflies (not the good kind, the unsettling kind)._

_It wasn't that his mum would disapprove, no. It's just that it's something so new, and unfamiliar. Something he hasn't had the glory of doing before._

_It's Harry._

_Six feet of sweet nothings, a blur of glitter, rosy cheeks, and loopy smiles. Harry. All him._

_He puts the mug down with feeble hands. And from the opposite side of the kitchen the bacon sizzles in the pan. Jay finally ties her floral printed, raising a brow._

_Poma gives off a distant meow._

_And that's Louis' cue._

_“I just..” Louis stops, recollecting the indignation of his mums features. And it's something so worried, and anxious, “I don't know. Mum, I feel like—”_

_“Oh, God. No,” his mum leans her weight onto her palms, staeing over at him with big blue eyes. “Don't tell me you two broke up.”_

_“Jesus, no.”_

_Louis feels his knuckles blend in with the frost white of the kitchen walls._

_“As I was saying,” he starts again, and this time his mum stills, akin to a stationary portrait. “I love Harry so much, mum,” he feels heat prickle at his skin. And it's not the warmth of it all, because Harry's not here. It's the goddamn thought of him. “I don't think, that, even if I tried, I'd find anyone that I'd want to love forever.”_

_Jay's bottom lip nips between her teeth, she nods her head._

_And Louis sees it._

_He sees that she's getting old, and the crinkles at her eyes are more prominent that before. He sees the dull, blue of her almond shaped eyes._

_If this isn't his cue, and a hint, to just fucking spill it, then the world must be messing with him._

_“I came here today, not because we broke up or because we're having problems. No.”_

_He shoves his hand into the pocket of his denim jacket, fingertips catching lint before long fingers wrap around a velvet box._

_He pulls it out, his heart beating faster than it had before, and really, he should calm down. He might go into cardiac arrest._

_Lifting the box onto the kitchen island, right beside the ocean of black fur that is Poma and simultaneously, the lid opens._

_Light catches the silver. A derp glimmer of white beams out of the box, a glint of shimmer swirling across the room._

_His mums gaze flickers down to the velvet box from Tiffany and Co's, and everything stills. Even Poma's pink tongue settles back in the warmth of his mouth._

_“It's because I want to marry him. Been wanting to make Harry my husband for a very long time now.”_

_It's like, getting hit with an anvil— sort of._

_The bacon in the pan sizzles, Poma meows lazily and a thud echoes from upstairs. It all has a dramatic effect._

_“If you're coming here, to get my approval, Louis, then you've gone bonkers.” Jay says, and there's something as clear as the winter Sun sprawled across her face, “You could've told me this over the phone.”_

_Louis is at a loss for words. Because, this is not the reaction he had been imagining._

_“You shouldn't be here, now, no,” she tells him. He sees it then; a speck of a shine. And— God, he knows what's to come next._

_“Mum, don't cry. Christ.”_

_His reply is a muffled noise of a choked up laugh. A blurb of a tear rolls down his mums cheek, and she bashfully wipes it away with her fingers. “I'm sorry, bun, I'm just— you're finally going to ask Harry, and that's like, he loves you and you love him and—”_

_“Yes, he's_ it _for me.”_

_Out of instinct, just like Louis had predicted, a sea of tears roll down Jays cheeks. He rolls his eyes, and steps around the island, wrapping both of his arms around his mums waist._

_“How am I going to deal with you at the wedding?” He jokes._

_She hiccups, and Louis can feel remnants of her tears soaking up the material of his t-shirt. One Harry had specifically picked out for him this morning, before kissing him goodbye._

_“Oh, shush, you.” She laughs faintly through her tears. “I'm just so happy, ecstatic even, for both of you. You're getting married, and Harry's going to be my son-in-law.”_

_And then the slosh of thuds grow louder from upstairs._

_They both roll their eyes out of instinct, like a pre-existant norm._

_“Let me guess, Phoebe and Daisy are up already?”_

_“I reckon. Do you want to stay for breakfast, or are you—”_

_“No.” Louis says quickly. Because he knows what his mum's about to ask, and he's not, no. Not right now anyway, he's still got a ton of courage to muster up, “about that. I think it'll take quite sometime for me to, like, ask him, mum. I'm dizzy with the nerves.”_

_Jay laughs loudly, and wipes at the corner of her eyes. “Are you nervous? Wait—” she catches herself, rolling her eyes at her own stupidity, and Louis laughs meekily, “silly question. Of course you're nervous.”_

_“I'm just a bit afraid. I know he'll say yes, mum, that boy's been wanting me to propose since our first date, he's made it obvious. But, like,” he stops himself mid-sentence when shattershock blond hair swoops into the kitchen._

_“What's all the fuss about?” Lottie questions, padding over to the fridge, and ducking her head in, “mum crying,” she says from behind the door of the fridge, “Harry not being here. Has he forgotten to invite you to girls night out?”_

_Jay rolls her eyes at her daughter, and Louis laughs._

_“True that, Lotts,” Louis eggs on. “Harry's left mums bookclub too, says he's instead indulging in Donna's merciless fight for the return of Housewives of Beverly Hills.”_

_Lottie laughs so loud that Poma lifts his body lff the marble island, jetting his claws out and jumping down on all fours._

_Jay scowls, swatting Louis._

_“Oh, c'mon. Donna's petition for the return of Housewives of Beverly Hills was, and still is, utter bull. She made fairy cakes, without the glitter, and Harry agrees with me. Just you wait, I'll ring him up—”_

_“No, no. Let's not,” Louis laughs, reaching forward and blocking his mums reach from the telephone._

_Lottie pulls a carton of milk out, uncapping it, and pouring some into a glass. She peers over at her mum, and brother._

_“Where's Harry, anyway?” The blonde asks. She lifts the cool glass of milk to her mouth, taking a languid sip, “by now he would've been talking about Caitlin Jenner with mum and Félicité already.”_

_Louis let's out a muffled laugh, and Jay shakes her head, instead tending to the finished bacon, scooping it up onto a plate._

_“He's at a spa, though. I booked him in at some Russian, Japanese salon. So he's probably drowning in the NBHD, and pink lemonade.”_

_“Shush, both of you!” Jay scowls at them, and they both erupt into laughter. Louis leans back against the wall of the kitchen, “you make Harry and I seem like such girls. Wait until I tell him.”_

_“You know what,” Louis says, grabbing his jacket from the island, “suddenly I'm so fascinated in Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare. Tell me mum, what's the secret, magical potion you put in those scrumptious fairy cakes?”_

_Jay ends up laughing, shaking her head._

_“No, but really now. Where's the husband?” Lottie asks, and Louis' stomach swirls with butterflies._

_Jay catches his eyes from the other side of the kitchen, mumbling, “_ Husband. _Such a fitting word.”_

_Louis rolls his eyes, “I was serious, he's probably getting his nails done now while being fed Thai rice.”_

_“Needed to get rid of him for the day?” Lottie asks, wiggling her brows. She gets up on one of the stools in front of the island, picking at the golden bacon._

_“Again, so fitting.” Jay sounds._

_“Mum, you've got this one,” he laughs, the butterflies kicking in._

_And it's not because he doesn't want to tell his sister. It's just that he's so nervous, and not being married to Harry already feels like marriage._

_Hell, even his seventeen year old sister was able to pin-point it. Even she rationalised that they're more than just boyfriends._

_And when is there not a better time to drive home, get down on his knees and ask Harry to marry him, if not now?_

_“I'm proposing.”_

_The air moves slowly, and Louis' breathing is languid. The bacon Lottie's holding stops mid-air, and everything is a swooping contradiction of what he had felt on his way here._

_He even stopped on the M5, pulled his car to the curb, and puked out this mornings outmeal and banana._

_“Finally,” is all Lottie says, dipping the bacon into her mouth, and chewing. Through a mouth full, she says, “well, go ahead. You might wanna' hurry, he's probably getting a mouth full of some hot, buff Russian lad.”_

_“As encouraging as that is,” Jay rolls her eyes from beside Lottie, “Louis here, is too nervous.”_

_It's then that Lottie's eyes catch sight of the ring on the island, reaching forward with oiled fingers, she scoops if up into her palm._

_Louis is quick by her side; swatting her wrist, and grabbing the velvet box. “Get your greasy hands off it. And no, I'm not nervous. It's just that Harry's so unpredictable. I know he'll say yes, but he's young. Who would want to get married at this day and age, so young?”_

_“Harry talks about marriage to Félicité and I like it's a religion,” Lottie rolls her eyes, not seeming fazed in the slightest, “he has a copy of_ What To Expect When Expecting _, and mum—” she turns to Jay, raising a brow, “lads can't get pregnant, can they? At least that's what they taught us in year five. He's gone bonkers, mum, Louis' husband's gone bonkers, I tell you. He probably draws hearts around the name_ Harry Tomlinson. _”_

_“Shut up,” Louis jokes, flicking at Lotties earlobe with his finger. “Leave Harry alone, only I get to call him mad. 'sides, he isn't mad. Relatively unrealistic is what he is, but.”_

_“Ah, see, mum.” Lottie turns to her mum, pointing a finger at Louis as Jay sips from her Yorkshire tea, “they're already covering up for each other, and using codenames for crazy. They're practically married.”_

_It's supposed to be funny, but Louis can't help and take it to heart. Everyone sees that they're already married, even when they're not. And he can't help but wonder, if Harry sees it too._

_“I'll ask him tonight.” Louis says, rolling his eyes at his mum and sisters exasperated looks, “can't have something boring and dull, without making it a special proposal for my minx, now can I?”_

 


End file.
